'Anti-Semitic' robbers target Jewish family near Paris

A Jewish family was beaten, held hostage and robbed in their home near Paris because of their religion, French authorities and anti-hate groups said Sunday. Three attackers burst into the house in the Paris suburb of Livry-Gargan late Thursday, cut off the electricity and confined three members of a Jewish family, beating them and threatening to kill them, until one of them managed to escape and alert the police, said anti-Semitism watchdog BNVCA. One of the victims was Roger Pinto, the 78-year-old head of Siona, an association “defending the Jewish people and the state of Israel,” Pinto’s lawyer, Marc Bensimon, said.